Kicked Out
by Pinkie Tuscadaro
Summary: Joey kicks Craig out after he steals the car and sends him back to his dad's house. Craig's feelings of rejection, Albert trying not to resort to violence, and Joey wondering if he made the right decision.


I took a shower when I got up, you know, before school. I still felt like I wasn't used to being here. Living with Joey and Angie. It was great in a lot of ways, I mean, things were so laid back here and everything. I just wasn't that used to laid back.

So I went downstairs, drying off my hair, and I hear Joey on the phone. He's asking his mom to watch Angie because he has some get away weekend planned with the current girlfriend. I don't know about Joey's girlfriends. There's a lot of them, and they all kind of look like my mom. My mom was tall and had dark curly hair, and all these girlfriends do, too. But they're all so young. Too young for Joey, I think. He's like 30. But whatever. He's dealing with losing my mom this way. I guess it's a way to do it.

So he's saying can she watch Angie. He doesn't mention me. His mom knows I'm living here for now. I like Joey's mom. She's nice. But I start to get nervous. Maybe he wants me to spend the weekend with my dad. I didn't know. I didn't feel ready for that.

"You're going away," I say to him, trying to sound casual. He nods, hanging up the phone, picking up all of Angie's junk. I follow him.

"What about me?" I say, kind of bracing myself for it. I'm so convinced he's going to say it that I can hear him saying it, 'well, Craig, I thought you could stay with your dad…'

"What about you?" he says, barely looking at me. He's starting to do dishes now. So I follow him into the kitchen.

"Where do I go?" I say, holding the towel I'd used for my hair in my hands, kind of twisting it. Willing him not to say it but I feel that sinking feeling. Of course he's going to say that. He didn't want his mom to watch me, for whatever reason. With my dad so close it just makes sense to send me back for the weekend. And it's not like I'm not going back there eventually, anyway. And did I think anything would change with him, with my dad? No. Not really.

"I thought you'd stay here," he said, and I blinked. Stay here? Unsupervised? That would be so cool.

"You're 14. You know how to cook. You'll be fine," he said, finishing up the dishes and moving onto Angie's toys on the coffee table.

"You can even have the guys over, that's fine," he said, and then he got about as parental as he gets. Which is to say, not very.

"But no girls, no parties, and no booze," he said, and I nodded eagerly.

"You can trust me," I said.

"I know I can, buddy," he said.

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It was weird for me to go from a million rules to none. When I lived with my dad there were a million rules. I swear I didn't even know them all. That's why I was always breaking them. These are the rules I had with my dad. I had to be home by six o'clock. The bed had to made every day. Everything had to be cleaned up all the time. I had to use coasters on the kitchen table. No eating in any room but the kitchen. I couldn't see Joey or Angela. I couldn't talk about my mom. I could have one friend over on his days off if he was home. If he wasn't home then no one could come over. No phone calls after 9 P.M. All that stuff. It doesn't sound so bad, except the part about seeing Angela. That's the only part that sounds bad. But I know how bad it was. And I didn't want to go back now. I was glad Joey wasn't going to make me.

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So I invited Spinner and Sean and Marco and Jimmy, but Jimmy didn't want to come if Sean was coming. I guess they didn't get along because of something that happened with Ashley. I liked Ashley. She was cool. But she was seeing Jimmy. That was cool, I guess. I mean, it was.

They were all excited, and so was I. But I had this nagging nervousness. Joey let me do things my dad never did, like staying alone and having everyone over. It would be fine, I knew it would be.

That Friday at school lasted forever. Staring at the clock, time just hanging there. Kwan's voice was oddly soothing, and I could barely keep my eyes open. I watched that clock and I swear to God it went backwards.

Finally the bell rang. Finally. We all ran out the doors, grabbing our bags and stuff. Wow. The whole house to ourselves the whole weekend. We went and got doughnuts and headed over. Joey was unpacking the car, he'd bought all the snacks and supplies. Chips and chips and macaroni and cheese. When we were walking over to him he got all serious, and he kind of glared at me.

"What's this? I go away for the weekend and you invite the whole school over?" he said, and I felt like I literally could not breathe. Crap. He was mad. Then he broke into this huge grin and I knew he was kidding. I was still kind of hyperventilating, and I saw Sean watching me. Sean knew, man. He knew how screwed up I was over my dad and everything. My dad never did that, he never kidded like that. Everything he said was so serious, he meant every word and every glare.

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It was getting boring. I mean, it was still cool, but Spinner was just eating massive amount of spray cheese. Marco was annoying Sean. I was bored.

Outside, chewing on a little bit of timothy grass, I tried to tell them how it was.

"I like you guys," I said.

"Are you gonna kiss us now?" Sean said, and Marco shoved him. Spinner shook up another can of spray cheese.

"No, I mean, with my dad, he never would have let me have you all over like this," I could see Sean understanding what I was saying. The others, they didn't know what a real jerk my dad had been. So Sean's nodding all serious.

"It must be real different, being here," he said.

"Yeah. Here, with Joey, it's like I can do no wrong. He even let me drive a car,"

This perked up everyone's interest. Spinner lowered his spray cheese can, Marco raised his eyebrows, Sean smiled.

"Really? That's awesome," Sean said.

"It was no big deal. Just some clunker from his car lot," I said, and then I smiled, "it was totally awesome,"

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They wanted to go for a drive. I didn't know. I mean, maybe we could. I knew where Joey kept the keys. We could just drive around the block and then go back, no big deal. But it was harder for me to do stuff like this because, because when I lived with my dad doing something like that would have had such serious consequences.

But they wanted to, and I didn't want to disappoint them. Besides, it would be alright. Joey would never know.

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It was so much fun. I felt better once we got the car back safe and sound. The cops didn't get us and we got the tickets to the Kid Elrick show. That was awesome.

Walking up to the office to put the keys away, laughing, slamming into each other, I felt my heart freeze in my throat when I heard Joey's voice. It was so sunny out that I heard him before I saw him.

"What do you think you're doing!" I looked up and squinted into the sun. Joey was walking down the steps from the office, pointing the phone at me like a weapon.

"Does the word silent alarm mean anything to you!" he said, coming toward me so fast that I stopped and flinched back. Marco licked his lips in this worried way, and Sean and Spinner just looked kind of stunned and concerned.

"You, you, and you, gone!" Joey said, pointing the phone at each of them, and they turn and ran. Traitors. But I guess I'd do the same thing in their place.

"Joey…" I started, not sure of what I was going to say. My heart was beating so fast. He caught me. He was mad. I could hear it in his voice and see it in his face, and every time my dad got mad like this I got hit. I tensed up, expecting a blow any second. And this time I deserved it.

"I don't want to hear it," he said, and he glared at me. I swallowed hard. I couldn't think. I could barely breathe. I thought of my dad, of the belt in his hand, how it felt coming down across my back.

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Angie wasn't home. She was still at Joey's mom's house. I wished she was here. Whatever would happen, it would be better if Angie was here. Me and Joey were in the living room and he was still so angry. I kept blinking, kept feeling my stomach tied in knots.

"Sit," he said, that edge to his voice.

"You're not my dad," I said before I could stop myself.

"Sit!" He yelled at me, and I felt it shake me, that yell. If he was gonna hit me I wished he would just do it. Just get it over with.

"Why don't you really be like my dad, huh? Go ahead, hit me," I said, daring him to do it. That was the bottom line of things. I couldn't get out of the mindset that bad behavior warranted a beating. Just hit me already.

"Sit," he said, and he was calmer, a little calmer. I sat, my legs bouncing up and down. I was looking all over the place. It was dim in the living room, dim after the bright light of outside. This was awful. I hated this.

"What you did was serious," he said.

"I know," I said fast, hoping he'd stop. I didn't want a lecture. I didn't want him to keep yelling at me.

"I don't think you do. Driving a car without a license? You could have killed somebody,"

I put my head down. He was right. How could I have been so stupid? Betraying his trust like that? Maybe my dad was right. He always said I always screwed up. I did.

"Craig, I don't know. I mean, maybe I shouldn't have left you alone. You're too young. That's my fault," It was like he wasn't even talking to me. He was talking to himself. I listened with this cold feeling.

"Stealing that car, though. That's too much. I wanted to help you, let you stay here for awhile. But this, I don't know. I don't know if I can handle this type of behavior," He wasn't yelling now or even sounding firm. He just sounded kind of sad. The cold feeling inside of me spread out to everywhere.

"Joey, I'm sorry. I am. I, I know it was wrong. I won't do anything like that again, ever. I swear. Please, Joey. I'm sorry," It was just like how I used to apologize to my dad, his eyes all narrowed at me, his hands balled into fists, or his hands on my shirt, pulling me forward and off my feet. I'd say, 'No, dad, please. Please. I'm sorry, I won't do it again, ever,' It never did any good, though.

Joey shook his head, barely even looking at me anymore.

"Craig, I don't know. I've been thinking about it. With Angie here and everything, that kind of behavior, I just…stealing a car? You're too much for me to handle. What was I thinking? Taking in an abused kid like this? Snake told me to watch out for some extreme behavior and I didn't believe him,"

Abused kid. I hated to hear it put that way. It made me feel stupid. I closed my eyes. So he thought I did this because I was an abused kid? But maybe I did. Maybe it effected my behavior. I did always screw up. I was a terrible kid. I knew that. I'd known that for a long time.

"Craig," he said my name with a kind of urgency, and I opened my eyes. I wouldn't cry. Maybe he'd ground me or something. Maybe everything could still be okay.

"Craig, I think you should go back with your father-"

"No, Joey, please. I'm sorry. I told you that, I am. I'm sorry. Don't make me go back, Joey-"

"Craig, your father has been to anger management classes. He's working on his issues. I told him what happened, I called him-"

"You called him?" I couldn't believe it. I just couldn't believe it.

"When I heard about the car, and I figured it was you. Yeah. I called him. He's willing to take you back. I think maybe it would be for the best. It's not a punishment, Craig. It's just, I don't think I can handle you,"

I just sat there, my hands on my knees. I looked at my fingers resting on the denim. So Joey was getting rid of me. I felt this different feeling about myself. I'd kind of thought, was starting to think, that maybe I wasn't such a bad kid after all. Staying with Joey and Angie all this time, I was starting to feel better. But now I saw that wasn't how it was at all. I was a mess. An abused child, and one with such extremes of behavior that it wouldn't be safe for me to stay here with Angie. Joey had been really going out of his way to let me stay here. I was just staying at some guy's house. It wasn't anything permanent. Not like Angie had. It was nothing like that.


End file.
